Eating the Way Nature Intended

The Paleolithic period, also known as the Stone Age, only goes back about two million years. Humans and other great apes have been evolving for the last 20 million years, starting back in the Miocene era. We hear a lot about the paleolithic diet, but that only represents the last 10 percent of hominoid evolution. What about the first 90 percent?

During the Miocene era, the diet “is generally agreed to have been a high-fiber plant-based diet…” For the vast majority of our family’s evolution, we ate what the rest of our great ape cousins eat—leaves, stems, and shoots (in other words, vegetables), as well as fruits, seeds, and nuts. I explore this in my video Lose Two Pounds in One Sitting: Taking the Mioscenic Route.

“Anatomically, the digestive tracts of humans and great apes are very similar.” In fact, our DNA is very similar. So, what do our fellow great apes eat? Largely vegetarian diets with high greens and fruit consumption. Just largely vegetarian? It’s true that chimpanzees have been known to hunt, kill, and eat prey, but chimpanzees’ “intake of food of animal origin is still at a very low level…with only 1.7% of chimpanzee feces providing evidence of animal food consumption.” This is based on eight years of work collecting nearly 2,000 fecal samples. So, even the most carnivorous of great apes appears to eat about a 98 percent plant-based diet. In fact, we may be closest to the diet of bonobos, one of the less known great apes, who eat nearly exclusively plant-based diets, as well.

Even our Paleolithic hunter-gatherer ancestors must have done an awful lot of gathering to get the upwards of 100 grams of fiber a day they may have consumed. What would happen if researchers put people on an actual Paleolithic diet? Not a supermarket-checkout-aisle-magazine paleo diet or some caveman blogger diet, but an actual 100-grams-of-daily-fiber diet or, even better, a mioscenic diet, taking into account the last 20 million years of evolution since we split with our common great ape ancestors.

Dr. David Jenkins and colleagues gave it a try and “tested the effects of feeding a diet very high in fiber.” How high? We’re talking 150 grams of daily fiber, far higher than the recommended 20 to 30 grams a day. However, 150 grams is similar to what populations in rural Africa used to eat—populations almost entirely free from many of our chronic killer diseases, such as colon cancer and heart disease.

The high-fiber diet didn’t mess around. Lunch, for example, could include Brussels sprouts, okra, green peas, mushrooms, filberts, and a plum. And dinner? How about asparagus, broccoli, eggplant, carrots, and honeydew melon? Surely, simply eating a lot of fruits, veggies, and nuts can’t be very satisfying, right? Actually, it got the maximum satiety rating from every one of the ten subjects, unlike the starch-based and low-fat diets which scored lower. Why? “All of the diets were designed to be weight-maintaining,” meaning the researchers didn’t want weight loss to confound the data. So, to get a full day’s calories of whole plant foods, the subjects had to eat about 11 pounds of food a day! Not surprisingly, this resulted in some of the largest bowel movements ever recorded in the medical literature, with men on the high-fiber vegetable-based diet exceeding a kilogram of fecal weight per day. You know how some people on weight loss diets lose two pounds a week? Well, in this study, the subjects dropped two pounds in one sitting.

That wasn’t the only record-breaking drop: A 33 percent drop in LDL cholesterol within just two weeks was seen. Even without any weight loss, bad cholesterol levels dropped by one-third within two weeks. That’s one of the biggest drops I’ve ever seen in any dietary intervention—better than achieved on a starch-based vegetarian diet or a low saturated fat American Heart Association-type vegetarian diet. This was a “cholesterol reduction equivalent to a therapeutic dose of a statin” drug. So, we need to take a drug to get our cholesterol levels down to where they would be normally were we to eat a more natural diet.

We’ve been eating 100 grams of fiber every day for millions of years. This diet is similar to what’s eaten by populations who don’t suffer from many of our chronic diseases. Maybe this shouldn’t be called a “very high fiber” diet. Maybe what we eat today should be considered a very low, extremely fiber-deficient diet.

Maybe it’s normal to eat 100 grams of fiber a day. Maybe it’s normal to be free of heart disease. Maybe it’s normal to be free of constipation, hemorrhoids, diverticulitis, appendicitis, colon cancer, obesity, type 2 diabetes, and all other the diseases of Western civilization.

Michael Greger, M.D. FACLM, is a physician, New York Times bestselling author, and internationally recognized professional speaker on a number of important public health issues. Dr. Greger has lectured at the Conference on World Affairs, the National Institutes of Health, and the International Bird Flu Summit, testified before Congress, appeared on The Dr. Oz Show and The Colbert Report, and was invited as an expert witness in defense of Oprah Winfrey at the infamous "meat defamation" trial.

106 responses to “Eating the Way Nature Intended”

Comment Etiquette

On NutritionFacts.org, you'll find a vibrant community of nutrition enthusiasts, health professionals, and many knowledgeable users seeking to discover the healthiest diet to eat for themselves and their families. As always, our goal is to foster conversations that are insightful, engaging, and most of all, helpful – from the nutrition beginners to the experts in our community.

To do this we need your help, so here are some basic guidelines to get you started.

The Short List

To help maintain and foster a welcoming atmosphere in our comments, please refrain from rude comments, name-calling, and responding to posts that break the rules (see our full Community Guidelines for more details). We will remove any posts in violation of our rules when we see it, which will, unfortunately, include any nicer comments that may have been made in response.

Be respectful and help out our staff and volunteer health supporters by actively not replying to comments that are breaking the rules. Instead, please flag or report them by submitting a ticket to our help desk. NutritionFacts.org is made up of an incredible staff and many dedicated volunteers that work hard to ensure that the comments section runs smoothly and we spend a great deal of time reading comments from our community members.

Have a correction or suggestion for video or blog? Please contact us to let us know. Submitting a correction this way will result in a quicker fix than commenting on a thread with a suggestion or correction.

We did not evolve from monkeys , why else did the monkeys did not evolve ?! Creator is hidden and skip the millions of years to what nobody can prove .
We are intelligent design what you can find everywhere in nature , Fibonacci , 1.618 also in human body .
The lie is also in food we eat we are designed to eat plant food diet . They educate doctors not for no reason to not find cure in the fuel we put into our bodies what causes the imbalance to being with . DNA yes is intelligent design . Fingerprint is unique , all children of god we are . Science tells you come from stardust the idiot liars .. We live in a world of lies I am sorry ..

I am reading Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari he is a historian and vegan he writes our ancestors were omnivorous. Our ancestors waited till all the animals were done eating so we can suck on bone morrow . Really good book look him up

you are right.I had IBS after a virus infection & fiber scraped my gut,couldn’t handle most grains in “normal ” proportions,no intact grains or beans,a low FODMAP diet helped somewhat but not completely.I think IBS is a general umbrella term as there is the mixed,constipated etc..types so in some cases fiber helps in others it hurts (physically)

‘Irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) is a common chronic gastrointestinal disorder. It is widely believed that IBS is caused by a deficient intake of dietary fiber, and most physicians recommend that patients with IBS increase their intake of dietary fiber in order to relieve their symptoms. However, different types of dietary fiber exhibit marked differences in physical and chemical properties, and the associated health benefits are specific for each fiber type. Short-chain soluble and highly fermentable dietary fiber, such as oligosaccharides results in rapid gas production that can cause abdominal pain/discomfort, abdominal bloating/distension and flatulence in patients with IBS. By contrast, long-chain, intermediate viscous, soluble and moderately fermentable dietary fiber, such as psyllium results in a low gas production and the absence of the symptoms related to excessive gas production. The effects of type of fiber have been documented in the management of IBS, and it is known to improve the overall symptoms in patients with IBS. Dietary fiber acts on the gastrointestinal tract through several mechanisms, including increased fecal mass with mechanical stimulation/irritation of the colonic mucosa with increasing secretion and peristalsis, and the actions of fermentation byproducts, particularly short-chain fatty acids, on the intestinal microbiota, immune system and the neuroendocrine system of the gastrointestinal tract. Fiber supplementation, particularly psyllium, is both safe and effective in improving IBS symptoms globally. Dietary fiber also has other health benefits, such as lowering blood cholesterol levels, improving glycemic control and body weight management.’https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5548066/

On the other hand,didn’t Voltaire observe that a witty saying proves nothing?

Your comment has unwittingly caused me some pleasure though. To wit, exploring the word and witnessing how it is currently used. I was at my wit’s end as to how to reply until then. In fact I felt a proper nitwit. Clearly I’ll need to keep my wits about me when I read yourcomments from now on.

I can vouch for that! I had horrid IBS for years. Starting a WFPB program was difficult at first, but changed everything for the better! Try daily adding a little more high fiber foods like grains, soaked legumes, daily, and stick with it, you may be pleasantly surprised!

Marjority rule / Mob rule is not always the healthiest way to make decisions.

I like the studies, and I don’t mind the anthropology as a glimpse into history, but the diet wars doctors’ have abused those theories so much that it just added to the confusion and answering what was eaten back then doesn’t seem like a good way for me to make decisions, unless they have proof of bones belonging to people who lived to 100 back then.

It seems though that Neanderthals were like all other humans and were opportunistic eaters. They ate whatever was available locally. In the absence of agriculture, meat would have been the only practical sourse of bulk calories on the Eurasian steppe. Heck, if the alternative was starving to death, I’d eat meat too.

However, that doesn’t mean that all Neanderthals in all environments at all times ate a diet that was high in meat

‘ In contrast, no meat was detected in the diet of Neanderthals from El Sidrón cave, Spain, and dietary components of mushrooms, pine nuts, and moss reflected forest gathering’https://www.nature.com/articles/nature21674

I agree but there are books and enthusiasts that argue that moden humans are still largely adapted to an ancestral diet. A diet which most of them fondly imagine was high in meat. i think that this video is intended as a response to that way of thinking – still loudly promoted by the Paleo Diet, low carbers and carnists.

It is all pretty silly anyway since a diet that a particular species is best adapted to isn’t necessarily one which promotes healthy longevity in individual members of that species. There’s no real evidence that evolution has selected for healthy longevity – evolution is more about the survival and continuation of a species. This is evident in things like sickle cell anaemia and possibly diabetes which offer a survival advantage in certain circumstances but don’t promote healthy longevity.

Yes, the interesting thing to me is that “meat” in and of itself doesn’t taste good–plain boiled chicken, for example–not chicken pumped up with salt. How about ribs with no sauces, spices or seasoning? I think it’s what people put *on *the meat that makes it tasty to them. Pair that with a raw carrot, for example–no comparison–and winter carrots are so sweet right now where I live! Yum!

Yes! Finally! Been waiting for Dr. Greger to see this light for more than 7 years! Since early humans could not contain and control fire yet, they could not possibly cook their food. Everything they ate was raw, just like other species did (and still do). Out of more than a million species, humans are the only species on the planet to cook their food.

This has to be for people with an iron-clad healthy digestive system. As much as I would like to lower my LDL and total cholesterol I cannot fathom eating 11 pounds of vegetables daily. Eating raw food is especially difficult for my system as is such a large volume of food.

On the contrary, it may take some time to cultivate healthy gut bacteria when you start to eat a higher fiber content, but we are not designed like carnivores to digest flesh, it putrefies in our intestines and creates carcinogenic compounds and other serious health issues.

Lida, they ate 11 lbs of food because the researchers didnt want them to lose weight. As a smaller person, I eat approximately 1400 to 1500 calories per day, and get about 60 to 75 gm of fiber. This is not a lot of food.

I always hate it, when I can’t read the sources, here the study of Jenkins https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11288049
What kind of problem they have if everybody could read this study? Are they afraid we could start thinking for oneself?
It’s great to read about this massive intake of fiber but I think despite there wounderful observations, they still have some error in reasoning. This observations can change from good to bad after a while because a apple isn’t a apple anymore. Like all this other food. What I mean is, humans have changed the original fruits in fruits full of suger, they make them bigger. The soil isn’t ok novadays and there are many other differences between today and the Miocene era. Right?
Nevertless, one think is right: Eat us much fiber as you can, daily! ;-)

Heilpraktiker. Heilpraktiker (“healing practitioner”) is a naturopathic profession in Germany. It is recognized as an alternative and complementary health care profession by German law. A heilpraktiker does not need to have any formal education or training but must do an exam at the health authorities.

In the blog Dr. Greger quotes that chimpanzees’ “intake of food of animal origin is still at a very low level…with only 1.7% of chimpanzee feces providing evidence of animal food consumption.” According to fecal samples analyzed over 8 years.

The 1.7% animal food in the chimpanzees feces might have come from insects on the leaves, stems, and fruits. Probably the bonobos ate the same amount of insects. So our diet should include insects?

Actually Dr. the Bible says that at creation our early ancestors ate plants. In Genesis 1:29 He said “ I have given you every herb that yields seed which is on the face of the earth and every tree whose fruit yields seed. So your on the right track as far as the plant based diet.

The Creator knows best. End of that text says, “…to you it shall be for meat.” The archaic definition for meat interestingly is food, not animal flesh. My soapbox moment for the animal product industries working to claim sole rights to the word meat.

Well said Angela, science is catching up with the knowledge given to us by our Creator. It’s all in the owner’s manual. Dr. Greger, if you’re actually reading this, I challenge you to take the time to open up a King James Version of the Bible and read the book of Genesis. It will be a real education.

Dr gregor the whole point of your website and blogs are supposed to be that you base all your research on FACTS yet you lose all credibility when this blog is totally based on the THEORY of evolution. Thats the very reason i wont buy your book or recommend it to my colleagues .

The formal scientific definition of theory is quite different from the everyday meaning of the word. It refers to a comprehensive explanation of some aspect of nature that is supported by a vast body of evidence.

Many scientific theories are so well-established that no new evidence is likely to alter them substantially. For example, no new evidence will demonstrate that the Earth does not orbit around the sun (heliocentric theory), or that living things are not made of cells (cell theory), that matter is not composed of atoms, or that the surface of the Earth is not divided into solid plates that have moved over geological timescales (the theory of plate tectonics). Like these other foundational scientific theories, the theory of evolution is supported by so many observations and confirming experiments that scientists are confident that the basic components of the theory will not be overturned by new evidence. However, like all scientific theories, the theory of evolution is subject to continuing refinement as new areas of science emerge or as new technologies enable observations and experiments that were not possible previously.’

The concept of God allowing people to eat meat is one I have pondered even before this.

At the beginning of the Bible and the end of the Biblle, mankind doesn’t eat meat at all and we end with a lion laying down next to the lamb and not being afraid of being eaten concept.

When I ponder meat being discussed after Noah, what comes to mind is the discussion about divorce, which comes later in the Bible where there is a sentence related to God not wanting divorce, but the human heart being hard enough that God permitted it. To me, that is what happens in the wilderness, but by the end, it will not be happening and the lust for meat is spoken against the whole way through.

I say this because I know that the Christians who come here will need to process each thing at an intellectual scientific/medical level and a spiritual level.

I know that Jewish people and Muslims and Hindus and Atheists all also will process it through their worldview, but also through science and health level.

This is a medical site and I know that we each no matter what our belief systems have to do the process, but I know that you are sincerely wondering if this will come against your faith and I am saying that it lines up very well will the Christian Faith, except that where Dr Greger veers toward adaptation, we do intelligent design.

Don’t stumble over that. The things like healing diseases coming at 5% or less of the calories from animal products is developing a consensus because of how well it works versus so many diseases.

Christians do still generally acknowledge the natural selection part of the theory of evolution, meaning, if a white swan mates with a black swan you end up with a shift in the gene pool of swans and if you cross one plant with another plant, you end up with something new.

We just start at, if there is intelligent design in the system, it came from a designer.

Well thank goodness, we’ve finally gotten someone to rip the mask off of Dr. G and his adherence to “THEORY” instead of real
“FACTS.” We had to go through Copernicus and his ridiculous Heliocentrism; then we got hit with the triple beatdown of Quantum Theory followed by the General and Special Relativity THEORIES. Add in some Game Theory and then this latest canard, global warming/climate change. It’s absolutely outrageous that these beliefs are stated as fact!

Darwin, Planck, Einstein, Copernicus and the rest–all pretenders. Who do they think they’re fooling? They call them THEORIES cause they can’t prove nothing!! Case(s) closed.

Jane, I used to have almost annual bouts of excruciating kidney stones, so oxalic acid was something I always paid attention to. Once I switched to eating fully plant based and gave up all animal products almost 10 years ago, I eat whatever veggies I want without issue! (hope I didn’t just jinx myself, lol)

Hello Jane and thank you for your question,
(I think Deb is correct that you can find info about this in the FAQ section, but decided to answer your question directly).

I am a family doctor with a private practice in lifestyle medicine, and am a volunteer for this website. I have had a similar experience to that of Vegetater, below. I had a calcium oxalate stone back in 12/2011, about 3 years before I switched to a WFPB diet. A WFPB diet decreases the “dietary acid load” (DAL). See this video by Dr. G about DAL: https://nutritionfacts.org/video/protein-source-an-acid-test-for-kidney-function/ .

The major buffer for acid in your body is calcium, and if you have a high DAL, you will absorb more calcium from your food, some of which winds up in the urine. The best way to reduce DAL, as Dr. Greger mentions, is by eating plants instead of animal foods.

Thanks so much for the detailed explanation and references. I began to worry about oxalates because I was eating a lot of spinach. This helped a great deal as it is a bit confusing on how to best structure a healthy WFPB diet given that most of us were not brought up or taught this way of eating or anything about nutrition at all. I also am concerned about synergistic effects and how some even healthy whole foods, spices, herbs, and supplements (B-12 & Selenium for vegans, etc) might impact a particular condition depending on the individual. It is a travesty that our doctors do not know much about nutrition. I like the quotes: “ Stop using medicine to treat your food;” and “Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food.” However, basically I just want to know what to eat, the portion sizes, and how best to cook it (a complete diet plan) and I’ll do so to preserve my health! Even though, I have all these books and Dr. Greger’s advice, it’s still difficult to be sure. For example, I was not eating enough vegan protein and way too much fat. I guess doing the best I can is ok as long as I keep updating the information along the way per nutritionfacts.org. So grateful to experts like you and Dr. Greger who volunteer to help us! I do not want to end up a costly medical problem for my family or my country because of my diet. Thanks again!

You are welcome, Jane,
My volunteer work with NutritionFacts helps me keep up with what’s going on in the field. I’m glad my reply was helpful. Having had a kidney stone, I can sympathize with your concerns.
Dr.Jon

Steve, the answer to your question is at the companion video to this blog. At the 3 min mark (approx) you’ll see what they ate. Mean caloric intake was over 2500 cal because they were prevented from losing weight. You can see the menu also.

I think that in the study concerned, the experimental group actually consumed fewer than 70g of fibre per day not 150g. Perhaps there is some confusion in the text between the various studies that Jenkins has led over the years.

I am a Christian and I do not have any problem with Plant-Based as part of a Christian world view. Plant-Based is either Vegan to 5% animal products and the Bible is for moderation, against gluttony, and during specific times, biblically, the people did not eat meat. In the garden and in the desert where God took the diseases off of His people and with examples like the Daniel fast.

I understand that Dr. Greger, who is from a background of being Jewish, plus, an MD with a science background is not going to align with everything from a Christian background, but I have seen such health benefits from learning from these men.

The science itself is healing people with Heart Disease, Cancer, AutoImmune, Diabetes, reversing DNA damage, etc. I feel like that is the more important part. I have gotten rid of so many health symptoms and have learned so many useful things. I pray that the Christians who come here can show the love of God to Dr. Greger.

Deb, when Dr Greger initially posted the video that pairs with this blog, I looked up the sources. Jenkins’ study was available as a download, and you could see the diet they ate. It was fruits and veggies. It was compared to a starch based diet , and also a low fat (heart association?) diet. The menus were there. Fruits and veggies got better results than the other two diets. You get a sneak peak in the video.

I know that Dr McDougall uses a study where people were more satisfied eating a diet based on potatoes.

It interests me that this study, the starch based people were less satisfied.

Though I don’t think I could afford a diet with a lot more vegetables without starches. I am satisfied with the price is the starches and often have my grocery bill creep over $100 when I buy a lot of produce and I get a little bored when I eat too many frozen vegetables.

I am imagining eating a few bags of frozen peas and when I think about what I would add to that, it would be a few bags of spinach and a box of carrots. No matter what it would cost a lot more than beans and rice and potatoes.

I don’t believe there is an inconsistency for a Christian to go Whole Food Plant-Based. There is no mandate in the Bible to eat a lot of meat or to avoid fruit and vegetables or to eat sweets and drink alcohol. The diet presented is actually close to my understanding of what the Bible says to eat. There are verses about plants being used as food and as medicine.

I think your problem will be that this is a medical doctor’s site. Until there is a Christian doctor takes up the Whole Food Plant-Based movement, it will be medical doctors who cover it.

There are Biblical people who do go into the plants of the Bible and what they do medically, but I do not know of very many doctors doing this type of process and I do not think there is a committed Christian doing it yet. Though I do suspect that some of them may have been raised Christian and I do not pretend to know the faith walk of any of them.

I do pray for a Christian doctor to do it because people are getting healed eating plants and that is what the Bible said, so it would be a big bummer if Christians rejected it.

Doesn’t fire have something to do with human’s being able to consume larger amounts of nutrients? For instance cooking spinach reduces the size by a huge amount so you can eat a lot more of certain vitamins and minerals vs. raw spinach. Anybody know much about that?

Amen Deb, the abundant life is ours today! Nutrition is a faith based decision whether it is because we hear the Father in His Word or if science convicts a person to live in such a way that Christ describes us, either way the Word Christ was before science, 1000’s of years to us before science but also before anything ever was, Dr Greger knows this also. The hearing though is “The Gift” at work in us and not all are open to receive it which is a shame, the connection is more than I can explain 1 Cor 6:17, it has to be experienced

I do find all this rekigious nonsense very depressing. What does it say about the intellignce of our species?

It would at least be entertaining if neo pagans, Wiccans, Hindus, Jediists and others added their tuppence worth. If this was an Indian site, I suppose all the Hindu fundamentalists would be saying that the ayurvedic system came from the gods and is all we need to know. As it is a US site, we mainly get Christian fundamentalists and their interpretations of whichever bible translation they favour.. Tedious.

Dr Greger, who is presumably Jewish, doesn’t use the site to promote his religious beliefs. He just reports the science. Perhaps we should do the same.

I don’t think people are trying to promote their religious beliefs. I think they are reconciling their belief systems with what is being stated and I suspect that everybody who comes here has to do that and I don’t even mean just their spiritual beliefs.

Vegans come here and examine whether Dr. Greger is Vegan enough.

Cancer docs would come and compare what has been said versus their belief systems.

Lots of people come and compare what he is saying versus the other doctors both WFPB and others.

Everybody probably comes and compares it to their country and their ancestors and their immediate family and what they have seen happen in their lives.

I genuinely believe that every person who comes here will do the comparison to their belief systems process. It just is how we process the information. It cannot be in a vacuum.

I think that where you and I differ is that you are taking responsibility for your health and I am much more concerned about wanting people (corporately) to be healthier. America is still a nation with a very large amount of Christians and a growing number of Catholic people and to not have them go Whole Food Plant Based would be tragic to me.

I have had Christian friends challenge me on whether this dietary way is compatible with my faith and they have tried to present me with diets, which I didn’t find as healthy, as if those diets were more Biblical because a Christian presented the information. The Cancer community has a lot of that.

I do not find Whole Food Plant Based incompatible with my faith is what I stated. In fact, it is compassion-oriented and plant-oriented and good stewardship-oriented focus in a way, which is more compatible with what I see in the Bible than how I had been eating.

Millions of people’s health lie in the balance and that is important to me.

I really can’t understand why people believe this stuff in the first place. it is obviously all complete tosh.

More importantly, though, this isn’t a particularly appropriate place for it. I’d personally welcome it if the site had a ‘no religious and no political posts’ rule. There are plenty of other sites catering to these sorts of beliefs.

The temptation to post material in response to such comments – especially the crackpot ones of which there are already a couple – just gets too much for me at times. It makes me feel better but it doesn’t shed any light on the topic under discussion

Ah yes, today (3/5) is the start of another delightful Mercury retrograde transit. No doubt there will be plenty of quibbling and arguing going on here during the next few weeks. I think I’ll just watch from the bleachers till the end of the month or so.

Yep, chimps eat meat too, and there goes the meathead’s boast that meat eating created our larger brains. By the same logic, how come carnivores didn’t become the smartest animals on the planet? So many opinions… so little intellect!